Coronavirus news

The coronavirus Covid-19 outbreak of 2019/20 caused significant disruption and threatened losses across insurance and reinsurance markets, with some ramifications for ILS and cat bond investors and sponsors as well.

Regular readers will know that we're proponents of investing in insurance-linked securities (ILS) and reinsurance linked assets, recognising the beneficial features of the ILS asset class and what it can offer to a sophisticated institutional investor.Among these are, of course, the relatively stable returns that can be achieved over the read the full article →

During a period of broad financial market dislocation, the catastrophe bond space continues to exhibit resilience, and in the current operating landscape, the attractiveness of the asset class is enhanced, according to Luca Albertini of Leadenhall Capital Partners LLP.Primary catastrophe bond issuance has rebounded after a halt caused a slower read the full article →

TotusRe is proposing the use of a cell insurance structure, alongside public and private market participation and the use of retrocessional reinsurance, as a solution to cover multiple risks of national importance, including pandemics.TotusRe has been borne out of the collaboration of Liz Foster, Non-Executive Director of The Society of read the full article →

Markdowns due to potential business interruption claims from the Covid-19 pandemic caused some private ILS or collateralised reinsurance funds to decline during the month of April, while pure catastrophe bonds outperformed, ILS Advisers said today.April 2020 saw the average ILS fund return drop to a negative -0.18%, according to the read the full article →

Insurance and reinsurance group AXA has cited business interruption claims as one of the "most material impacts" in its new forecast for EUR 1.2 billion of losses in its property and casualty (P&C) businesses due to the Covid-19 pandemic.AXA has been a significant purchaser of reinsurance protection in recent quarters read the full article →

Matt Jones, Principal at financial technology (fintech), insurance or reinsurance technology (insurtech) venture capital investment firm Anthemis joined us for the latest in our series of video interviews.All of our Artemis Live video interviews can be accessed directly from our YouTube Channel and we have more interesting discussions with leaders read the full article →

The UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), one of the key financial market regulators and part of the Bank of England, is to run a test case to help establish the validity of business interruption claims from the Covid-19 pandemic.Numerous major global insurers are involved, including leading players such as AIG, read the full article →

The secondary market for catastrophe bond trading has offered some good opportunities in recent times, but with the focus now back on primary issuance, it’s an interesting moment for investors, says Stephan Ruoff of Schroder Secquaero.Ruoff, the Deputy Head of insurance-linked securities (ILS) asset manager Schroder Secquaero, a specialist division read the full article →

The Covid-19 pandemic is like a "live cat" for the reinsurance industry, one that will keep on driving losses, and this combined with the challenges caused by recent consecutive catastrophe loss years appears to have driven the market into a phase of "sustainable hardening," analysts at JMP Securities have said.Having read the full article →

The global reinsurance market will fail to make returns above its cost-of-capital due to the impacts of the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic, Fitch Ratings has said following a review of ratings in the sector.Cost-of-capital has been something the reinsurance sector has been struggling to earn for a number of years now.Around read the full article →